COVIDtown Crier: April 22, 2020

“Why are they publishing this Crier rubbish?” you may be asking. We certainly are. The rest of this edition of Mountain Xpress can’t help but show the tough times WNC is facing. Here’s one little spot in the paper where we offer a bit of levity, to possibly brighten someone’s day, poking a bit of fun at the outrageousness of it all.

Courtship activities return to roots

The lonely in love are, well, lonelier right now. It’s easy to match online, but then what? Meeting for coffee is a no-go, much less dinner and a movie. But dating apps are offering courting advice that hearkens back to earlier times — now with a CDC-approved twist.

For a first date, the tEnder app recommends scheduling your weekly grocery run at the same Ingles, where you could lock eyes and share a wink above a masked mouth from opposite sides of the produce department. Two gloved hands may even grab for the same banana.

If sparks fly while hunting and gathering, enjoy a picnic by the park, each of you ordering takeout and dining on adjacent benches, beneath the ambiance of an LED street lamp. Be sure to disinfect the bench before and afterward as a Mr. Manners-approved courtesy. Discuss the shared experience over video chat from just a few yards apart.

“Parking,” the retro rendezvous accompanied by “heavy petting,” is possible in separate cars, offers PlayWithMatches.com. Dates can caravan to a scenic overlook and paw themselves while staring longingly through two panes of glass at their courting partner.

MediocreEros.com even has ideas for getting physical. Revive the colonial American practice of “bundling” for an exciting blast from the past. After donning masks, gloves and face shields, family members can encase the lovebirds in individual plastic wrap cocoons and place them next to one another in bed for a night of chaste, protected bodily intimacy.

Local health department nurse Healy Wells was skeptical of these and other suggestions from dating services, commenting, “Good luck with all that: We couldn’t even get people to wear condoms while hooking up with random strangers before all this pandemic business.”

Dumps like a truck (truck, truck)

The Laborers’ International Union of North America may have dismissed noted Leicester-based conspiracy theorist Wanda Offthemap‘s claim that COVID-19 is a giant ruse for construction crews to catch up on projects as “total bunkum, pun most definitely intended,” but local industry workers aren’t denying the benefits of a largely empty Asheville.

“We’re adopting the reverse Field of Dreams approach: If no one comes, we can build it,” says project chief George Foreman. “Could we do any of this alongside bachelorette parties and Stu Helm’s food tours ? Or tourists driving between art studios and not buying anything? I think not.”

In addition to the “subterranean gutting” of Haywood, Walnut and College Streets, during which his crew claimed to see “multiple Ninja Turtles,” Foreman is spearheading the new roundabout project by the entrance to Wedge Brewing Co.’s parking lot. Touted as a tribute to European motorists, the traffic pattern replacing the five-point intersection is actually primarily intended “to [mess] with Southerners who weren’t taught how to maneuver them in Driver’s Ed.” Though Foreman referred to the existing “right-of-way nightmare” as “the greatest opportunity for Asheville drivers to show their asses, outside of crosswalks and highway on-ramps,” he’s confident in the potential entertainment value of three roundabouts within a half mile of each other.

“Rooftop viewing decks in this stretch of the RAD are going to be the new microbreweries. And if you have a brewery with a rooftop spot? Look out!” he says. “I’m going to call my broker now.”